JACKSON’S HOSPITAL MANAGEMENT. 
“wance of economy in the various heads 
of expenditure. Forty-eight attendants 
were found to be sufficient for 400 sick, 
and this diminution, (from above 100, 
the number formerly employed) united 
to the disuse of the purveyor department 
altogether, produced a saving of 2500). 
per annum to government. 
The author’s exertions in the public 
service do not, however, appear to nave 
met with the approbation of his supe- 
Tiors ; and the third part of his work is 
devoted to an examination of the ma- 
nagement of the hospital of the army 
depot, in consequence of some reflections 
thrown against it in an official letter 
from the army board to the Secretary 
at War. In this letter Dr. Jackson is 
charged with having carried a regard to 
economy toe far, and with having em- 
ployed too debilitating a plan of regi- 
mén and medicine, which gave rise to 
great mortality, frequent relapses, and 
tedious recoveries, with a debilitated 
state of the patients. .A board of army 
physicians acquitted him of those charges, 
and considerable pains are taken by the 
author to shew, : 
«¢ _2 that the hospital of the army depdt, 
while under his management, stands on ad- 
vantageous ground, in point of mortality in 
similar diseases with the, same hospital at 
other periods, or with other hospitals in other 
places. ‘Ihe cure also appears, p good testi- 
mony, to have been equally perfect as in the 
periods preceding or following. The time 
required for cure not more than half of what 
it was in the period which immediately suc- 
ceeded bis suspension from medical duty, or 
which preceded his appointment.” 
An-appendix, as large as the body 
of the work, is occupied with an account 
of the. principles which the author has 
adopted in explaining the action of 
causes in the production of fevers, and 
the action of remedies employed in their 
cure. From this part of his work we 
shall make a few abstracts, in order to 
shew his principal peculiarities of opi- 
nion and practice; but it may be ob- 
served, that his doctrines on this subject 
_do not now appear for the first time be- 
fore the public. 
Health, or the proper performance of 
the various functions of the body, de- 
pends upon a certain harmony, or asthe 
author chuses to call it rhythm (evb.x) of 
movement in animal bodies.. On the phx- 
nomena of life, and in many other parts 
of his reasoning, he adopts, in sgme 
yi! 
187 
measure, the principles of Brown, though 
with a modified language. 
«* The expression of life, or animal action, 
may be considered as a forced condition.— 
The nature of the radical quality in which it 
corsists is not known; but the expression of 
it is visibly called forth by the application, of 
peculiar and apprepriate causes. Its mani- 
festation is thus the effect of stimulation. A 
pause of restis the cause of action ; for it is 
a fundamental law of nature, that whatever 
is moved to action by stimulation tends to 
rest when the action, the effect of the stimu- 
lation, is produced. ‘Thus, as action is the 
cdonsegyiénce of stimulation, and a tendency 
to rest the consequence of an action com- 
. 
pleted, alternate action and rest, however 
varied in period,. necessarily follow each 
other, while the cause and condition of or- 
ganization preserve their relations. A cer- 
tain rhythm of movement is, consequently, a 
condition iwseparable from a living animal 
body; as the integ-ity of the order and force 
of that rhythm is ine index of health. Butas 
movement is an expression of the presence 
of life, and rhyt nical movement an expres- 
sion of health, so the mode of healthis liable 
to be perveité |, the motions of the machine 
to be even finally arrested or annulled. The 
scale of the deranged modes is extensive ; and 
as the modes are various, though errors, they 
hate their train of errors, and their produc- 
tive effects variously multiplied and com- 
bined.” 
«© A change in the rhythm of movement is® 
the first visible, even supposable step of ac- 
tion, arising from the operation of the causes 
of fever. Such derangement seems to pros 
ceed either from the application of powers,. 
which are in their own nature stimulant of 
the ordinary movements of health, erring by 
excess or defect of just quantity, or from the 
application of new and extraneous matter, 
stimulant in their nature, but subversive of 
natural moyvement—both in time and force, 
productive of new and artificial action in the 
mainutest circle of organization, communi- 
cated to.combined organs, and manifested 
in the operaticns of functions. This new 
action originates in the application of a new 
material ; the effect corresponds with quan- - 
tity and quality, and condition of subject to 
which the application is made. This last 
requires a minute consideration in forming an 
estimate of efiect, for it seems to be the prin- 
cipal circumstance which modifies the ex- 
ression of symptoms. Action is supposed, 
in all cases, to be in proportion to the force 
of the stimulating power, and the capacity 
of the excitable organ. This Hace gilierent 
conditions or capacities, —different degrees of 
facility or difficulty in manifesting action.— 
Whe facility in excess may be termed irrita- 
bility, the difficulty torpor. The constitu- 
tion varies radically, that is, constitutionally 
in different subjects ; and it varies im the 
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